


Lost and Found

by Shyftlock



Category: Fallen Hero Series - Malin Rydén, Fallen Hero: Rebirth (Video Game)
Genre: Another take on the diner reunion, Bars has no idea what he wants, Gen, Julián "Bars" Esparza, Ortega just wants to fix things, Ricardo Ortega - Freeform, and have his best friend back, did anyone pay the bill?, especially when it comes to Ortega's mustache, questionable usage of beer, thats for me to know and you to never find out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-12
Updated: 2019-10-12
Packaged: 2020-12-09 12:22:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,983
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20994737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shyftlock/pseuds/Shyftlock
Summary: Ortega finds Bars, as he always does. Bars tries to lose Ortega, as he always does. Bars has always been good at losing, but Ortega's never been good at being lost.





	Lost and Found

“Bars? Bars is that you?”

The sound of your name comes at you sideways and gets under your ribs like a knife. The familiarity of it sends you breathless, and suddenly your heart’s up in your throat so hard you almost choke on it. You know that voice, you know it but you can’t place it and you’re too full of ice cold shock to turn and look. It feels like something smashing into a raw void where a precious thing had been ripped out. It belongs but you weren’t ready for it and it  _ hurts. _

The chattering minds of the diner patrons are suddenly grating pressure against your shields. You scramble to reinforce the barrier. Walls slam up in your head. Chains and gates locked against the flood. The distance pushes the panic back but it also pushes  _ everything _ back and you’re suddenly sickeningly aware that you don’t even know if this is real. Your hands are shaking so hard that you can’t even clench them into fists.

Minutes ago the smell of diner food had you on the verge of ordering a meal to go with your beer. Now it just makes you feel sick.

The man’s standing barely a handful of paces from your booth, wrongfooted and shocked as you are. His hair’s got grey in it. That arrests you for a second-- how old he looks. How tired. It’s like looking into a mirror but you don’t feel any of the hate that usually bubbles up under your skin. He’s not feeling hate either. You can’t feel what he’s feeling because his mind’s static against your shields. Shields that are coming apart because you’re too thrown to keep them solid.

You can’t feel what he’s feeling but you can see it.

His eyes are so wide and full of tender hope that you almost lose the contents of your stomach right there.

Then your eyes catch the mustache and a horrible, strangled laugh threatens to crawl out of your chest because it’s  _ fucking _ Ortega. It’s fucking Ortega because nobody else you’ve ever known could pull off something that looks so terrible. Nothing’s ever looked bad on the man and that abomination of a mustache is doing its best but it still can’t make you hate his face.

You can’t hate him even though it’s your most desperate wish in this moment. 

You’re dangerous.

And not only that, but he failed you. He didn’t save you, he wasn’t there and you don’t want him to try to start now because you can’t  _ handle _ having hope again. It would break you faster than anything your enemies had ever done.

All of your thoughts get snagged up in your head and run in over each other and what doesn’t come out of your mouth is  _ god, I missed you _ or  _ sorry, you’ve got the wrong guy  _ and what does is:

“What the hell are you doing here?”

The words crawl out from your lips slow and snarling, spiked and hostile and they drop to the ground like they weigh a thousand pounds. The bitterness is so intense it startles you and it does worse to Ortega. You could have put a blade in his gut and the hurt on his face wouldn’t have touched this.

His expression crumples. 

He steps forward like he wants to take something precious out of an inferno but it’s already halfway burnt up. 

You don’t react. You can’t react. There are a million things going through your head and they’re all getting away from you and you can’t do anything so coherent as think beyond this immediate second.

So you just sit there, face rigid and blank. Your hands are still shaking.

Ortega takes a seat and a shuddering breath.

He doesn’t ask. He just inserts himself into your life like last time and he’s never cared what you thought about it. You loved that about him and you hated that about him. 

“I thought you were dead, Bars.”

His voice is hoarse. There are tears and questions behind it. You don’t want either of those. You don’t think you’ll survive either of those. 

Self preservation kicks in. 

It’s not a muscle you’ve exercised recently and it doesn’t quite register until you’re halfway up and out of the booth. Ortega’s reaching out for you but not touching you and his voice cracks in half when he stutters out “Bars,  _ please-- _ ”

You stop with an unnatural suddenness. His fingertips are inches from your elbow and even though you’re wearing two shirts and a jacket you can feel the phantom touch like a thousand sun bright needles. You want it like you want a scalding shower, like you want a good hit in a spar. You want it even though you know it will hurt because the pain will make you feel real.

Everything in you that’s been running circles snaps into alignment. You need to leave. He’s here because he’s suspicious, he’s here because you’re caught. 

Even if he isn’t, you’ll be over the moment he starts digging. Ortega’s like a dog with a bone and the dog’s starved and possessive. Nothing matters more than finding an answer once he’s got his teeth in the question.

Each second you spend with him is a second closer to your plans being crushed between those jaws.

Your whole world’s crystal clear and you have to run. But you sit back down because it’s been seven years since somebody’s spoken to you like they care about you and the hunger inside you is so much it hurts.

You don’t look at Ortega as you awkwardly fold your shaking hands into your lap. You stare at the bubbles in the beer in front of you. You want to drink it but you know you’ll drop it if you try.

“I can’t believe...” Ortega trails off and a brief glance tells you that he’s got a painfully genuine smile on his face. It’s tempered with faint confusion and more than a little bit of concern but it visibly takes years off of him. “You’re not dead. They said you were dead. What--”

He stops when you cover your mouth with the collar of your jacket. It’s a safety blanket, a little hiding that’s always made you feel more protected. The cost is that Ortega knows this tell.

“Are you okay?”

Well the answer to that one is a hard no.

“I’m still breathing,” you say with a little shrug. You let go of the collar of your jacket to cross your arms on the table. You hate it instantly and lean forward, tucking your face into your shoulder to get the pressure back on your mouth.

Your head’s angled out towards the main dining area. It’s not crowded but there’s no shortage of customers. They’re all talking. You can see them talking but their voices are muted to you. Like hearing surface thoughts behind light shields. Like a conversation in the next room. All you can hear clearly is your heart beating jackrabbit fast and Ortega shifting forward across from you at the booth.

“It’s. Uh, it’s been a while,” you manage.

“Seven years,” Ortega fills in. “You were-- I was… ”

He presses his index and middle fingertips against the surface of the table and taps them a few times.

You remember how his lightning tasted when he threw it crackling over your shoulder in countless battles. Even if you couldn’t read his mind, the two of you could read each other after only a few short months working together. He’d never hit you, not even when your jagged fighting style put you right in his path. You knew the brush of his power but never the force of it. You don’t think it was because of your superior evasion skills.

Now, being near him feels like standing at the mouth of a black hole.

It’s all want and void and  _ unreal,  _ getting too close this time won’t just send static up your spine. It will take you apart. There’s not enough of you left to afford more cracks.

“You went out the window and I thought--” Ortega’s smile slips a little as he tries to meet your eyes. You don’t let him. “We had a funeral for you. You and Anathema. You were  _ gone. _ ”

Your mind catches a bit on  _ funeral, _ if there was a whole funeral it had to be more than just Ortega in attendance? Who else would-- oh. For Anathema. Of course they’d show up for her. She deserved it.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were alive?” Ortega’s question brings you crashing back. There’s hurt there in his voice and it lights a magmatic ball of absolute fury in your chest. How dare he put this on you. He wasn’t the one who died. He wasn’t the one who had his mind flayed open and his body--

You catch the gasp behind your teeth and crush it ruthlessly.

What are you even supposed to tell him? You never planned on seeing him again. At least, not as Bars. Not unarmored and unprepared and half drunk. The beer on the table wasn’t your first taste of alcohol today, it was just your first at the diner. You wish your head was clearer but it’s spiraling again and there’s a cacophony of voices all telling you different things and you don’t think half of them are even yours.

If you tell him too little he’ll keep digging-- maybe not right this moment but he will. If you tell him too much then you would be ending it all here and no matter how off balance you feel you’re not ready for that yet.

You wish you were sober.

You’re good at lying but lies are so, so much work and you don’t think you’ll be able to remember what you made up once you’re miles and hours away from here. 

The truth, then. Just a little of it.

“I didn’t get up and walk away from that fall,” you start, halting and hesitant. Your eyes meet Ortega’s and he’s dropped the smile for a look of attentive concern. His shoulders are squared towards you and he’s leaning forward. 

His attention is electric and you feel phantom lightning crackle across the back of your tongue. You want oblivion. There’s nowhere you’d rather be than curled up back on the floor of your shitty apartment. Every word that comes out of your mouth is like choking up barbed wire.

“I’ve always had… enemies,” you swipe your hand through your hair and tuck your knuckles against your lips. You’re showing way too much right now, you should be casual about this. You should move like you’re over it, like it’s old and done and you’re just a normal person now.

But Ortega’s eyes on you are like live wires and it’s making you shaky and talking to him is bringing up so much you thought you’d never have to deal with again and--

And he’s waiting for you to continue. Patient but expectant. It’s been seven years and apparently he wants this explanation and maybe he deserves it even though nothing inside you wants to give it to him.

“They got to me-- I don’t know. Soon afterwards. Before I woke up again. I don’t think I ever made it to an actual hospital. They’re the ones who faked my death, I’m sure of it.”

More? Less? Is that enough? You don’t know. You don’t know and Ortega’s still waiting so you continue.

“I… wasn’t doing well. It took me a long time to escape there again,” you stutter halfway through  _ again, _ you didn’t mean to let that out. You didn’t mean to let that out and your vision’s getting dark around the edges. Your breath catches and you are  _ not _ going to have a panic attack in the middle of a busy diner you are  _ not. _

You pull yourself somewhat back to center and look up to stare a hundred yards through the wall beyond Ortega’s shoulder. “By the time I got free, it was… it felt like too long. To come-- b-back.” You almost said  _ home. _

“You’d all gotten your closure and I’ll never be in the game again so I thought it’d just be better to leave it like that. I’ve never been… a great friend and I didn’t want to suck you into my problems,” your arms are crossed again and you’re leaning forward over them. Not leaning forward towards Ortega, just curled in on yourself. You manage to get yourself to sit back a bit, meet Ortega’s gaze.

“Bars...” Ortega trails off and tips his head back. Exasperation is humming off of him like electric arcs. “Did you ever think that maybe I’d want to make that decision myself?”

The nervousness rattling around in your system stills a touch. You can do arguments. You know how to push people away. “Maybe I knew what you’d decide and I didn’t want to deal with that.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” 

You’re pressing buttons but you haven’t hit enough of them yet to tip him into anger. Do you want that?

You don’t. But you should.

“I didn’t just walk out the front door of… that place with a jaunty little wave, Ortega,” you mean to snap the words but they just sound tired. “They’ll never stop looking for me and anyone I get close to is in danger. I didn’t want to do that to you.”

Ortega reaches out to you in that little halfway manner of his. Hands outstretched, flat on the table. Just a little distance so you had the choice to make contact. You never did. You never would. 

“Bars, I would risk my life for you. Any day. You’re my friend and you know I can take care of myself. You know I’m good in a fight. I would-- I wish you would have come to me. I would have helped. I  _ will  _ help. Just tell me what I need to do.”

“Stay away.”

You drop the words like hand grenades and lash out your arm, spilling your half-full beer across the table and down Ortega’s front. You bolt out of the booth and your steps stutter only once when you realize you haven’t paid for the beer you just soaked your best friend with.

You reach out and snag the mind of a passing waitress and send her towards Ortega. She’s watching him get up out of the booth and the beer’s spilled across him and the table and he’s coming up after you.

“Excuse me sir, can I get you the bill?” she says to Ortega and you  _ run. _

In retrospect you should have known he would come after you.

You crash into a man just outside the diner door and the flare of anger in his head is like a brand in yours. You skid off to the side and scramble to keep your footing as you dodge around a teenager on a skateboard. The sun’s high and hot but you were sweating long before you made it outside.

You’re out of shape and shaken up and you’re not covering your tracks. Ortega’s not at the top of his game either. It was easy enough to read that in the grey in his hair and the lines on his face. But he’s still in the game.

“Bars! Bars,  _ hey! _ Hey!”

You’ve barely made it a block when his voice calls out from behind you, closer than you expected.

You slow just enough to let Ortega catch up to you.

His footsteps are just behind you and--  _ Now! _

You whip around and shove him into an alleyway, putting him up against a wall. One of your hands is fisted in his collar and the other at his shoulder. Your hip’s against his, pressing him into the brick. There’s open surprise on his face and anger on yours. Your hands are static and it’s not because of Ortega’s powers.

This is the most physical contact you’ve had with a human being in years and it’s punched you almost headblind. All your telepathy can taste is the roaring static of Ortega’s unreadable emotions. You gasp in a breath.

“Let me  _ go! _ ” Your voice is high. It’s barely a half inch away from breaking.

You get a stranglehold over your telepathy and in the space between breaths you’ve built a shield around you and Ortega reaching to the mouth of the alley.  _ Look away, _ it says,  _ nothing to see here. _ “Let me keep you  _ safe! _ ”

You shake him a little and the only reason he hasn’t broken your hold is because he hasn’t tried.

“I want you to be--  _ happy, _ ” you choke out. The summer air is hot in your lungs and it feels like dust and it’s stifling. Letting him get involved now would only hurt him. You won’t stop, you won’t stop for anyone and you won’t stop for him and you know it’s going to hurt him and you’d rather he didn’t know until too late. You wish he hadn’t seen you. Hadn’t known you were back until you were dead again. Maybe if you make him hate you it won’t hurt him so much when he pries the faceplate off your armored corpse in a year. 

Maybe you can make him hate you but the words that just came out of your mouth are going to make that a little difficult.

“Happ--  _ Happy?! _ ”

Maybe not.

“You thought that it would make me  _ happy _ to think you were dead?” Outrage pulls Ortega to his full height. It’s just an inch taller than you but it feels like miles. He bats your hands off and steps forward.

You step back.

He keeps coming.

“Bars, I thought you were dead for seven years,” Ortega says, high and loud. There’s hurt wrapped up in there. A lot of it. “I thought you were dead and I thought it was  _ my fault.  _ I thought that I let my best friend die.”

Your back hits the opposite side of the alley and your stomach drops through the ground when Ortega doesn’t stop. Your shoes grate against the concrete as you scramble to press yourself further into the wall.

“Did you think I’d  _ forget _ you?” Ortega asks, quieter now. 

“I hoped you would.” It’s strangled, but it comes out clear enough. You run your hand through your hair. It’s long and choppy and the right side’s half the length of the left and for a second you wonder how Ortega even recognized you in the first place.

You don’t even recognize yourself most days.

“I’m sorry,” you whisper as the silence extends. “I don’t want to have a fight. I’m sorry.”

Ortega paces a few steps off to the side. He gives you a deeply sad look over his half turned shoulder.

“I don’t want to lose you again,” You say. “I… The simplest way to do that was to just not. Not have you… there… again.”

“I don’t want to lose you again either,” Ortega says. 

He sighs.

It’s a soft noise and you don’t like how much he’s putting into this. You wish he would have let you go but you know that the little core of you still holds onto him too tight just like he does you.

“Can we start this over?” Ortega’s shoulders are up and uneven. Nice to see someone else has no idea what they’re doing either.

A laugh forces its way out of you. “Hi there, I’m Bars. Nice to meet you.”

“That’s not how it went the first time,” there’s a little smile there on Ortega’s face and you hate how much you like it.

“No it was a lot more like ‘fuck off, you’re not dying anymore so stop hanging on me,’” you pull away from the wall a little, barely steady on your feet.

There’s an extended second where you and Ortega look at each other in dead silence.

Then you both burst out laughing.

“God, we’re a mess,” you say breathlessly.

“Speak for yourself,” Ortega says, then succumbs to another laughing fit. It winds down after a few seconds and he just breathes. He’s looking at you like you might vanish.

He paces over to lean up against the wall next to you. After a moment, he slides down to sit on the ground. You copy the motion.

The silence isn’t awkward as you wordlessly watch people passing by the entrance of the alley. None of them look your way. Your shield makes sure of that.

If only it worked on Ortega.

You make an inarticulate noise of frustration and drop your head onto your knees.

“Bars?”

“Yeah?”

“You okay?”

“Mmmmmmrrrrrrrggh.”

Some days really were better when you didn’t get out of bed in the morning. This would have been one of them.

“I’m retired,” is what you settle on, tipping your head back against the wall. “Sidestep’s dead and Bars is--” Bars is dead too. “Bars is here. That’s what I’ve got for now.”

There’s another prolonged silence and you can feel Ortega sizing you up. It makes the hair on the back of your neck prickle but you don’t challenge him on it.

“Are  _ you _ okay?” you ask, picking at a loose thread in your jeans. They’re almost worn through at the knees.

“I’m a lot better than I was. And you not being dead does a lot of good too,” Ortega takes a deep breath and his analytical stare’s enough this time that you meet his eyes.

You not being dead does a lot more bad than good but you’re not planning on telling him about that. Not now.

“You--” Ortega’s mouth twists. He falls quiet, but it’s restless. He visibly gathers himself and continues. “You’re still a telepath, right?”

“What?”

“You still have your powers?”

“The hell kind of question is that?”

“Is that a yes?”

“I-- yeah, of course I’m still a telepath. I don’t really-- I don’t have a lot of use for it anymore but it’s there.”

“I have a,” Ortega pauses again. His hesitance makes you not want to know what he’s having such a hard time getting out. “A friend who could use your help. Like, telepath help.”

“Well unless they want me to guess what number they’re thinking of I can’t guarantee I’ll be much use. I’ve been out of the game a long time.”

There weren’t a lot of things that fell under the category of ‘telepath help’ that you were even vaguely interested in doing for an unnamed friend. But it was Ortega asking and saying no to him has always been… difficult.

“What do they need?” you sigh. Might as well at least get the story before trying to work yourself up to turning him down.

“It’s a little… sensitive. I’ll need to call her before I fill you in,” Ortega stands slowly and dusts off his pants. There’s a little bit of spiteful delight cracking through your chest when he looks down mournfully at the beer stain across his front. He always was a little too vain for his own good.

Which does absolutely nothing to explain the mustache.

Maybe he lost a bet.

He glances at you like he thinks you’re going to run away again but you’re drained and as hilarious as it would be to take off while his back was turned you don’t feel like stirring up more drama.

You don’t really bother to listen in on his phone call. You get the gist of it and the gist of it is that whoever’s on the other side of the line isn’t keen on Ortega’s idea to bring you in. That makes two of you, maybe this’ll be easy to get out of.

Easier, at least, than getting out of whatever you’ve gotten yourself into by seeing Ortega again.

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't written this much in a year and I haven't written more than this in longer. It's nice to finally have the inspiration to stretch out all these incredibly rusty prose gears. Here's to hoping this fandom gets me out of my massive writing rut.


End file.
